


one is desire (the other the means)

by newyorktopaloalto



Series: baby, the skies'll be blue [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon Divergence - Iron Man 2, Crack, Crack Treated Seriously, Falling In Love, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Happy Ending, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Insta Love, Iron Man 2, Iron Man 2 AU, Love at First Sight, M/M, Making Out, Misunderstandings, Near Death, Near Death Experiences, POV Steve Rogers, Post-Captain America: The First Avenger, Protective Steve Rogers, Romance, SHIELD is vaguely incompetent, Secret Identity, Secret Identity Fail, Spies & Secret Agents, Steve in Natasha's role, Unresolved Romantic Tension, secret agent man
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-13
Updated: 2018-12-05
Packaged: 2019-06-27 00:49:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,752
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15674679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/newyorktopaloalto/pseuds/newyorktopaloalto
Summary: When Steve agreed to assess Tony Stark for SHIELD, Fury left out the one fact that would have had Steve shaking his head and immediately refusing the job: Tony Stark? God strike Steve dead, but the man wassmokin'.[IM2 but Steve can't keep a secret identity to save his life; also, Tony's pretty fly for a dying guy.]





	1. oh no, he's hot

**Author's Note:**

> Oh, pals, this is 50% crack and 50% melodramatic Steve angst. It also doesn't really follow the plot of IM2, because I'm basically only taking the 'Tony dying' and 'SHIELD honeypot' aspects from it. 
> 
> I had a lot of fun writing this, so I hope you have a lot of fun reading it. Aiming for three chapters. 
> 
> I'm so sorry, in advance. All the jokes are TERRIBLE.

“Hi—Dr. Stark?” Steve killed his own question as Tony Stark (DOB: 5/29/1973, billionaire, genius, former CEO of Stark Industries and current SHIELD pain in the ass) slammed his head against the top of whatever metal plate he was currently soldering, scowled in the general direction of Steve through squinted eyes, and scrutinized him in a manner more befitting of Natasha than a civilian, Howard Stark for a father or not. 

“Call me Tony.” 

Steve was about to speak again, if only to admonish him for his lack of professionalism; Fury told him to start slow—being eager for something more than professional wouldn't bode well for Steve's chances on giving SHIELD an accurate report on the now staring at him oddly because, fuck, how long had it been since he hadn't said anything—

“Who are you?” 

“Oh!” Steve fumbled for his story (the truth, his story was the _truth_ for all intents and purposes, and according to his mission parameters.) 

“Ms. Potts sent me, I'm your new PA.” He held out his hand, only to have it left hanging as Stark sized him up; Natasha must have given the man lessons at some point, the similarity of their expressions were so uncannily alike to be coincidence.

“Okay,” the word was elongated, and Steve startled the slightest bit at the remnants of the standard: yell out your window to the neighbor across the way, yell at the other driver even though it's obviously their right-of-way, yell at the butcher when he chintzes someone on the fat that they 'paid for with my good money, damn it!', New Yorker accent in the word. “Who are you, though?” 

“Um...” 

And Steve blanked. 

Who was he, really? A man out of time, unfrozen and immediately placed into undercover work because who would recognize a long-dead American propaganda piece who half of the current US population thought of as nothing more than a Davey Crockett-esque urban legend, burnt into the pages of history bookended by signs around Chinese workers claiming their ancestry and pictures of GIs holding up women so they could kiss their man goodbye at a train station headed for the front lines. Everyone he had ever loved was dead, dying, or so far by the wayside that recognition would be more painful than letting them live in peace. He was no one, because he technically didn't exist—a product of the US government, ever since he signed away his life for the chance to be like all the other boys. And look where that had gotten him: goading a dying man into doing reckless shit in order to 'test his mettle' or whatever it was that Fury was trying to get out of Stark, pretending to be fine with living life this way, fine being a monkey that (while not dancing, thank God for small mercies) might be doing something even worse? Who was he if everything that was needed of him now were things that he had never been before the serum? 

A throat cleared and Stark, to his own credit, only looked minimally like he was preparing to call an institution to take Steve away, and—

“I meant, like, your name, I didn't mean to give you a conniption with the question,” and Stark ran his hand through his hair, uncaring of the grease spreading through it and it was disgusting but... he laughed nervously and Steve couldn't remember his name, fictional or real or anything. 

“Captain,” he managed to squeak out, “Steve, I mean—Captain Steve Rogers.” 

What the fuck did he just do. 

“Not like the one that—well, _yes_ like that because my dad was a fan, but I mean, I'm not actually Steve Rogers, you know, Steve Rogers.” 

Stark nodded slowly along with him and licked his lips in what must have been an unconscious gesture because when Steve couldn't help but swallow at the motion, he got a bemused eyebrow raise for his trouble. 

“So, Captain Steve Rogers, but not _that one_ ,” Stark teased, “you're my new PA?” He leaned against a worktable, crossing his legs and raising his left eyebrow to match his right one. (How did a man that was literally weeks away from dying of palladium poisoning manage to look that good? It was like a siren and a wood nymph had a baby and that baby was so tired and so classically arranged that it made Steve want to weep with aesthetic appreciation—and boner appreciation, but that was an entirely different conundrum this would inevitably incur.) 

“I am.” Steve nodded decisively, hoping to God that there wouldn't be an issue but knowing that there most certainly be one, because Fury had warned him that—

“Okay.” 

Steve blinked. He must have looked like some sort of imbecile, because Stark pursed his lips as though smothering a laugh. 

“Okay?” 

A nod. Silence. The two of them staring at one another until Steve knew his freckles were standing out due to the slight pinkening of his cheeks. Stark smirked like it was a checkmate. (It was, of nothing else, a check.) 

“Can I do anything for you, Mr. Stark?” he asked after it became obvious that there would be absolutely no on-site training coming from the man in front of him. 

“Yeah,” he rifled around his worktable for a scrap of a paper and scribbled what looked like a number on it. (Was Stark giving Steve his number? Maybe he found the stuttering endearing, or maybe he really was as easy as Hill had insinuated, or maybe he looked at Steve and was just as struck by him as Steve had been of Stark.) “Make sure that any and all calls coming from this number are blocked, okay? They've been sneaky and getting around J by routing themselves through official business lines, and sometimes I do think that J lets them through because he finds annoying me something of a pastime—it's like everything I create wants to annoy me to death...” 

He trailed off and Steve felt something hard in his throat as the obvious connotations seemed to catch up to Stark once more; about to say something, Steve stopped himself just in the nick of time—he wasn't supposed to know about Stark dying, after all. 

“J!” Stark called out after an awkward moment of silence, “say hi to our new overlord!” Stark winked at him. “At least, if we find you as efficient as Pepper was—J would personally find that hard to believe, but maybe you'll surprise him.” 

“Hello, Captain Rogers, I am JARVIS, Mr. Stark's AI; if you would like, I will show you to your office on level 2, and we can get all of your paperwork in order.” 

“Uh, SI and Ms. Potts already took care of that,” Steve hedged, hoping that this JARVIS wouldn't find anything that could contradict whatever he could remember of his cover—slowly sieving out of his brain at the reality of what he was doing, the reality of being face to face with Tony Stark because _damn_. (The conversation between him, Fury, Natasha, and Hill had been an interesting one that consisted mostly of Fury and Hill trading off descriptors that they felt fit Steve, Natasha nodding along as though everything they were saying made total sense, and Steve trapped in the middle of it all, wide eyed and feeling more like he didn't belong in the 21st century than ever before.) 

“We like to keep our own records,” Stark shrugged easily, giving Steve another brilliant smile that left him wrong-footed—again, damn it—before it turned into something a little more serious. “But seriously, call me Tony.” 

“I can—” he paused over the term, his tongue saying it but his brain still trying to understand what it actually meant. He sounded like a foreigner. (He was a foreigner.) “—fax it over, Mr. Stark,” 

There was a stunned silence. 

“What are we in, '96? Faxing? Jesus H. Christ on a cracker, what are the men in black actually teaching you?” 

“1896 didn't have faxing, Mr. Stark.” 

Stark—Tony, if he were going to be like that about the entire thing—pinched the bridge of his nose, Steve pursed his lips at the gauntness that his profile revealed, and muttered something indecipherable about pirates, the Cold War, and lycra body-suits. 

“Well, it's a good thing I was _very obviously_ talking about 1996, am I right, Cap? You mind if I call you Cap? I figure if I give you a nickname, then you'll say my actual name instead of this Dr., Mr. business that you have going on there. We're going to be spending a lot of time together, Steven G. Rogers.”

“Uh...”

“Great, so I'll see you in like an hour, yeah?” Steve was sure he wasn't supposed to notice the subtle pulsing light that he was sure indicated to Tony something about his health, if the way the other man started to lightly sweat was anything to go by. “And remember, no calls to and from that number, okay?” 

“Okay,” Steve muttered, “see you then, Mr. Stark.” 

He left the room as Tony called out an: 'it's Tony!' behind him. As the door shut, Steve looked at the number and swore.

The number Coulson and Fury used to call Tony about their various initiatives and ventures. 

Shit. 

This would be a little harder than Steve thought, and not only because he found Tony to be literally the most attractive person he had ever had the pleasure of meeting. (And if that 'in your face,' volatile personality was anything like how he usually was? Sign Steve the fuck on; he had a type, God strike him dead.) He couldn't be sure, but he thought he heard laughter come from the workshop as he leaned against the wall, a few seconds after a 'God help me,' fell from his lips—he had forgotten the walls were glass. 

“Captain Rogers?” 

Steve started, looked up in a desperate attempt in scoping the area for who had seen him both half-bewildered and at half-mast, and then, after another few seconds of fruitless gaze wandering, realized he had recognized the voice. 

“JARVIS? You're not just in Mr. Stark's workshop?” 

“No, Captain, I'm everywhere.” 

There was absolutely no hint of a threat in the words of the AI, nothing in its tone to denote anything more than pleasant, if academic in tone, repartee, and yet Steve couldn't help the shiver that went down his spine at the implications. (This was, no matter how hard Steve back searched his mind, absolutely not in the SHIELD files of Tony Stark, at least not to this extent, and with this little wrench in the plan... Well, there wasn't much of a plan if half his time spent in subterfuge couldn't actually be spent subterfuging due to the very nature of an omnipresent AI that belonged to the man he was supposed to be interrogating.) 

“Oh. Well, at least if something happens, you can be of assistance.” 

“That is what I am here for—to seek and eliminate threats of Mr. Stark. Like yourself.” 

A second went by, then another one, and a third for good measure, and Steve still couldn't breathe even after he knew that his silence was bordering on suspicious (as if his entire self during the last minutes could be considered normal for anyone.) 

“You are, after all,” JARVIS continued, with the same even and pleasant tone that Steve could only now associate with hot brunetes and panic attacks and inevitable death, “his new PA, and that will be your job as well. Not in quite the same capacity, I will admit, but nevertheless an important part of the team to keep Anthony Stark secure and un-threatened.” 

“Uh-huh,” Steve squeaked out, the whiplash of this emotional trauma still going strong in his mind. “Hey, random question: do you have surveillance capabilities in the restrooms?” 

There was a pause as though the AI were thinking of how to answer; Steve found himself fidgeting the longer his heart had time to process the adrenaline and forced itself out in minute, but mildly annoying, habits. A crash from the workshop stole his attention for a minute, but the walls turned themselves opaque before he could process anything more than Tony Stark on the ground, one of his robots already on its way to help him with whatever it was the man needed. 

“Is he—?” 

“I do keep minimal surveillance. What that entails is...” JARVIS continued his explanation of how his surveillance was kept, thoroughly distracting Steve with technobabble he didn't quite understand, until he was safely ushered away into what was to be his new office, away from where he could keep an eye on Tony and see what was going on. 

“I think a PA will be good for Sir,” JARVIS concluded, and Steve blinked up at the ceiling. 

“What do you mean?” he asked, glancing at his phone to see if the hour had passed, noticing he had sixteen unread messages from various SHIELD numbers, and slipping it back into his pocket. 

“Someone to help with responsibility, keep him on the—pardon my colloquialism— up and up.” 

Something that was most definitely guilt gnawed at Steve, and he gave a wan smile to the upper right corner of the room. 

“That's my job,” he murmured, turning on the tablet that would be his new best friend when working for Tony Stark, “keeping Tony Stark on the straight and narrow.” 

“I would not expect anything less from the man who lied nine times to get into the army.” 

“Seven,” Steve corrected idly, smiling down at the tablet that actually seemed hefty in his hands, not like something that when squeezed incorrectly would break under his grip—most things in the 21st century seemed flimsy, but if all new Stark tech was this durable, Steve could understand why Tony was considered _the_ innovator of the last fifty years. 

“Hey, how long did Howard and Tony work together for?” 

“They did not.” 

It was icy, and Steve frowned. 

“Good or bad thing?” he finally asked, unable to at all interpret JARVIS' tone. 

“The best thing,” came a voice decidedly not JARVIS, and Steve almost dropped the tablet at the sight of Tony—sallow, shaking, and a strained smile. 

“Mr. St—Tony!” Steve yelped, his chair flying back and partway into the wall behind him as he sprung to his feet. 

“Easy there, soldier,” Tony smirked, a little more real than what he had on before, but still nothing like what Steve imagined it could be with a working immune system and a fair amount of Steve showing him everything they could be together, both in bed and out of it. 

“Um,” Steve looked behind him, grimaced, and tried to come up with an explanation that wouldn't defy basic strength capabilities. 

“You know those are reinforced?” 

“I... did not.” 

Tony looked him up and down, considering. “Hot.” 

Steve almost died. (For a moment he thought he had, that he was in heaven with this gorgeous creature snarking at him for the rest of eternity, and Steve? Could not give less of a shit about working for his country, for the world, for the ostensibly government-run SHIELD and if Tony didn't trust them and he was, you know, _Tony Stark_ , then maybe Steve was maybe a little bit hasty in agreeing to work for the first people that threw a hook into the water he had been drowning in.) 

“What?” he choked out, feeling his face on fire when he finally got enough wits about him to say something to the still gaunt (but his eyes—Steve felt blinded by a two-by-four every time they hit him with their intensity) but slightly healthier-looking man. 

“Your strength, and, well, and your triangle-shaped body; it's hot, honeypot.” 

“You're hot,” Steve countered unthinkingly, his face seeming to color even more as Tony's grin turned softer. 

“I cannot believe this right now,” Tony swore, looking vaguely up at the ceiling where he was obviously addressing JARVIS (Steve thought this only made him seem human after the last couple of hours being more ethereal than anything else, and found that the call back down to earth didn't actually hurt and only made Tony seem actually accessible—disregarding, you know, the whole Steve being there for SHIELD purposes and Tony being nothing more than a mark.

(Steve wasn't quite sure whether he wanted Tony to be a mark anymore, if he wanted to work for SHIELD at all anymore, if he wanted to do anything more than learn the exact curve of Tony's neck in junction with his forehead, with his hand, with his lips, safe and sound in the futuristic mechanical heaven that Steve didn't know would feel more like home than anything had in the last two years.

(He had to save Tony first.) 

“You're terrible at this, you know?” 

“At what?” Steve asked, having lost the thread awhile back. 

Tony gestured around, encompassing everything that Steve was and also the entire room around the two of them. 

“Choose something,” he stated. 

“Also,” he continued, trying to make his fall into Steve's guest chair, leaving Steve to fish out his own desk chair from the wall; it took a couple minutes longer than he expected it to, and he could feel the back of his neck sweating as he finally turned and faced Tony—who looked to be on the verge of passing out. 

“Tony, are you—” he hesitated to say anything more. 

“Also,” Tony spoke over him, his narrowed eyes stopping Steve in his tracks in saying anything, “to answer your original question less flippantly: my father and I had a complicated relationship. He wanted...” 

A pause wherein he crossed his arms over his chest, leaned in a little (and if Steve couldn't help but lean in too with only the desk separating the two of them from their faces being inches apart, Steve's lips hovering over Tony's as their breaths puffed out in anticipation—well, that was between him, Tony, and JARVIS' ever-present sensors) and nodded decisively. 

“Well, he always wanted a son more like you.”

“Me?”

Tony tilted his head, befuddlement clear on his face for a second, before it smoothed out in an eyeroll that Steve wasn't sure he was supposed to see or not. 

“Captain America,” he elaborated. 

“Oh.” His reply came out small and all at once he imagined a Howard Stark who couldn't get past the war, who couldn't let go of a past that he so clearly needed to, and a smaller Tony Stark, desperately seeking any kind of attention from a father who was more interested in ghosts than his own son. “I'm sorry.” 

“Captain America isn't you,” Tony waved away, nodding to Steve as though he, himself had come to a realization, “you're Steve Rogers; Captain America is an icon, a purpose and not a person.” 

“Yes,” Steve nodded, agreeing. “I'm just named after him.” 

The sentence seemed extraneous, even to himself, and he wondered for how long he could keep up the facade of being someone else other than who he actually was—considering he wanted Tony to know _him_ as opposed to some SHIELD-approved version of him—and for how long he even wanted to. If he had ever really wanted to. 

“Steve?” 

He blinked out of his reverie and smiled down slightly down at Tony, still significantly taller than him even with the both of them sitting down. “Yeah, doll?” 

Tony seemed to seize, and Steve knew it wasn't due to any poison he might have in his body. 

“I mean Mr. Stark, I mean Tony.” Steve licked his lips anxiously, watching Tony do the same and he could have been wrong but it seemed like they both swallowed hard at about the same time. 

“I was thinking of having a birthday party.” 

Steve, for what he was worth, didn't outwardly show any signs of bewilderment at the non-sequitur, and instead just held his tongue and decided to _think_. 

SHIELD would, obviously, want him to enthusiastically agree to anything that would place Tony Stark in a compromising position and force him to act, but it wasn't as though SHIELD would actually know he would be the one to disagree with Tony's question, would they? (And even if they did, would Steve actually care about the formal reprimand or—secret hope of all hopes—official expulsion from the agency?) Was he ready, however, to compromise everything he had spent the last two years acquiring?

Tony sucked in his lip, his slightly crooked front teeth shining for a moment before being shoved back into his mouth; Steve tracked that for a moment, before dropping his gaze to where Tony was tapping his fingers anxiously against his knee. 

“I—” he hesitated as Tony's eyes (really though, those eyes would be the thing that would always get him, Steve believed, even when they were both old and ugly, Tony's eyes would always be the _thing_ ) flashed in an emotion that Steve would know if only given a couple of months of intent watch and pursuit. There was, in the face of that, only one thing to say. 

“I don't think that's the best idea.” 

Tony beamed and Steve knew that was the best decision he could have made, regardless of whatever his job actually was. 

His phone vibrated, but a smile still crept onto Steve's face as well.

Fuck SHIELD. 

(And also, hopefully, fuck Tony Stark.)


	2. Steve 'memelord' Rogers d-d-d-d-d-d-d-duels James 'are you joking?' Rhodes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve makes a major decision--one that will literally change the course of his life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so I wrote this one and decided that the fic needs 4 chapters, actually. (And maybe an epilogue.) 
> 
> Thank you all for the kudos, comments, and subscriptions! I hope you enjoy this chapter~

With a greasy bag in one hand and his prototype Stark tablet in the other, Steve descended the small staircase, rounded the corner, and stopped dead in his tracks. 

“—can't you just accept it like a normal person? I'm trying to _give_ you something here, and you're looking at me like I'm Chrissa Pope, and believe you me, I do not have good enough of a rack to pull that off.” 

Tony looked defensive, eyes narrowed and body taut against the side of his worktable—he looked no more worse for wear than the day before (noticeably worse than the week before, and that was the real thing that concerned Steve; a concern that, no matter what he told himself, was a lot more than SHIELD would approve of. He wondered, imagining Fury or Coulson's face as he asked, if there was some sort of form he had to fill out: 'Form 265.3, Intention to Date a Target in a Personal Capacity.' Doubtful, but something Steve was sure they must have had some precedent for.

(He would ask Barton, because Barton probably set it.) 

“No, but you're a good enough liar.”

Steve could only see the back of the man, dark skin peeking out from from the military precision haircut and freshly pressed outfit, but he didn't need anything else to ID the figure standing, most likely arms crossed, straight against Tony's own convex posture. 

“That hurts, honey bear.” It was flippant and Steve believed it for a second—he was more than sure it didn't fool James Rhodes for any amount of time; Steve didn't know he was a particularly jealous person, especially if he had no logical reason to be, but here he was, fists clenched like that one me-me Natasha had shown him. “I have to let you go now, unfortunately, very busy; I'll have it delivered tomorrow...”

There was a pause and Steve's eyes followed Tony's tongue as the man tried to loosen out his posture—their eyes met (Steve supposed that JARVIS had finally been able to let Tony know of his uninvited guest) for a moment and Steve flushed, holding out the bag in his hand desperately, as though that could be some sort of explanation for why he had been standing there, obviously eavesdropping in on what could only be a private conversation. By the way Tony's eyes narrowed again, this time with an actual hint of ice in them, the explanation was 'no bueno' (as Tony tried to explain to him the week before; Steve didn't understand the need to be fake bilingual, but it he supposed it was just slang like everything else.)

Colonel Rhodes made an about-face and it was the first time since the serum that Steve felt like someone was looking down at him and seeing nothing more than a scrawny waste-of-space. He felt a chill crawl up his spine; this was Tony's best friend, and Steve knew that he was absolutely worthless in the older man's eyes. The three of them stood, staring at one another, before Steve witnessed Rhodes sighing, gesturing for him to come into the lab; Steve, for what he was worth, didn't actually move until Tony gave the okay—the slight twitch of Rhodes' lips could have meant anything, but Steve took it as a sign of respect for respecting Tony's work space. 

“I brought you food?” He had no intent in making it a question, and by the raised eyebrows of the best friends, they didn't expect his statement becoming a question as well. 

“You see what I mean?” Tony asked Rhodes, completely ignoring Steve in favor of making a vague gesture over his shoulder at Steve's entire self. “This is absolutely ridiculous—I shouldn't have to put up with this.” 

“Are you joking here?” 

Rhodes eyed him up, a little quirk to his lips that Steve took to be befuddlement, and Steve felt himself shifting from foot to foot, a nervous, tight-lipped, smile on his own face as he stood with the greasy bag slowly slipping from his sweaty grip. Rhodes' eyes followed Steve's fist as it clenched tighter on the bag. 

“Steve Rogers?” 

“A-yup,” Steve nodded, shuffling forward after his legs unfroze from the combined weight of Rhodes' and Tony's stares. He placed the bag on the table next to Tony, ignoring the man's slightly widened eyes at the movement, and moved back a few paces to keep the both of him in his sights. 

“I got that for you,” he swallowed at the silence. “It's a cheeseburger. And some fries.” 

“Are you joking?” Rhodes was incredulous, glaring at Tony as the other man tried, futile, to shush him. 

“I almost wish.” It was sighed out, and Rhodes scoffed as Tony blushed—the light freckles on Tony's face stood out the longer the two men stayed silent. Steve _knew_ he was missing something, and it was most likely something important, and he knew he should care for professional purposes, but all he could care about was the personal reasons that he wanted to know exactly what they were looking at one another about that would make Tony's complexion take on that particular hue. 

“You're kidding me.” 

Steve watched Tony shrug, immediately on the defensive that at some point between Steve coming in and now, had managed to dissipate into a light anxiety; Steve felt an irrational protective instinct flare up within him at Tony's sudden change. A second before he was going to make a comment, he stopped himself, knowing (he had been paying a lot of attention to the man and his habits, so sue him; which, when Steve thought about it, Fury might do on the DL—thanks again, Tony—if Steve couldn't do his _goddamn job_ ) that Tony wouldn't want to draw attention to it anymore than was probably already apparent to his old friend. 

“I can't help it—it started out from childhood but then...” he gestured vaguely again, this time to the room as a whole, but Steve still felt as though they were talking about him. 

“Are you sure it's not just leftover trauma?” 

Tony shrugged, frowning a bit at Steve, who smiled awkwardly when he noticed. He was already absolutely screwed, so why not just make it down the entire boulevard of conspicuous, weird behaviour? (At the end of his first day on the job, be had backpedaled from his 'fuck SHIELD' position, on the what he now knew to be incorrect notion that he might have been overreacting to the situation—after all, SHIELD would know their own history with Tony Stark than Steve ever could—but was quickly dissuaded of the notion within the following week or so of spending a significant amount of time with the other man; it had taken until now however, jealousy turned up to eleven at facing 'completely-platonic to Tony' Rhodes, that he would finally let his mission fully turn from 'SHIELD lapdog' to 'doing whatever Tony might ask of him'. Tony hadn't even _done_ anything in particular to make Steve think this way except just live his life, but here they were, and now Steve knew that nothing would be the same.) 

“I'm sure.” 

“How long was that?” 

“24 seconds, Colonel; 24.8, if you want to be precise.” 

“Thanks, J.” Rhodes turned from facing the ceiling to Tony once more. “Wow.” 

“Yeah. It's fucked, Rhodey, it's way fucked. And yet...” 

“And yet,” Rhodes agreed, shaking his head as though Tony had done something to both amuse and begrudge him. “Hey, Rogers?” 

Steve startled, sucking in a breath as he swallowed around some saliva that had managed to fill his mouth in his spasm of nerves. “Uh?” 

And with that verbally effusive answer, Rhodes seemed uncaring of whatever question he was originally going to ask, instead focusing on what was _obviously_ the most important thing in the situation. “Has anyone told you how eloquent you are?” 

“Uh, no, Colonel—I've been known to punch first and ask questions later. Or never.” A few scenes of decapitating Nazis with his shield frazzled around his brain and he reconsidered his words once more. “Usually never.” 

“Oh my God—I think I would have preferred the one before. The redhead.” 

Natasha's face jumped to the forefront of Steve's mind, and he gaped at Rhodes; Steve wasn't aware Rhodes had known about Natasha at all, in a professional governmental capacity or not. Briefly, he wondered if SHIELD ever petitioned congressmen for further funding, or if it was one of the black budget parts of the Military Industrial Complex that had met its inception in the sudden economic rush of the war he had been prepared to die in, the country he was prepared to die for. (He wasn't sure if he was ready to die for it again—any of it—which was most likely the root of the problem, Tony Stark's absurdly attractive face or no.) 

“Natalie Rushman, spy extraordinaire? I can only imagine.” Tony's gaze turned sultry—an imitation of Natasha that Steve would, until his death, deny was almost better than Natasha's own—and he slouched in a modicum of the beginning of a pornographic video. “ _Oh, Mr. Stark, I can only imagine what you go through, being Iron Man and developing Stark tech. It must be so..._ ” Tony licked his lips and lowered his lids in what could only be described as one of the filthiest invitations Steve had been privy to (and either the air circulation was wonky, or Tony literally just took Steve's breath away—tone to the point of irreverent mocking, not withstanding.)

“ _Well, it must be so hard_.” His voice dropped to a silk and Steve was suddenly grateful for the tablet so he could stand at attention with it placed—very subtly, if he said so himself—directly over his _own_ hard problem. 

“Jesus, Tony,” Rhodes laughed, shaking his head as he finally stepped away, obviously ready to depart, “you're going to make the man self-combust.” He shot a grin at Steve, more shark than human, and waved to Tony as he started walking away. 

“Shipping it tomorrow!” Tony yelled after him, grinning, feral, at Rhodes' rude gesture in lieu of a verbal confirmation. 

Steve, of course, hardly noticed this exchange, too busy trying to find something to concuss him within the next few seconds while Tony was still distracted. There was, of course, a great many number of items he could use, but the thought of possibly staining any of Tony's work with his blood felt like marring the Venus de Milo or something equally as precious to the history and innovation of humanity. He had hoped, obviously irrationally, blood way further south than it should have been, that no one would notice any of his reactions to Tony and Rhodes' conversation. (Which—if one thing stuck out in Steve's mind—was surprising to him in more than one way: he had no knowledge of any previous SHIELD attempts to infiltrate Tony Stark, let alone on that had failed; the man, his staff, must be on a higher alert than normal—it was a wonder that Steve managed to get into Tony's life with what little effort SHIELD put into his backstory.) 

Time for a distraction, and maybe Tony would forget to make fun of him. 

“What're you shipping?” It was the wrong question, if Tony's closing-off face meant anything. 

“Suit,” was the curt reply. 

“Like the—?” 

“Yeah.” 

Steve blinked, blinked again, and then a third time, trying to process what on earth Tony had in mind with this latest decision. He licked his lips, a little thrill going through him as Tony's gaze seemed to falter at the motion. 

“Hey, Steve?” 

“Yeah?” 

He was going to take Tony somewhere nice someday—somewhere not too fancy, maybe a little homey, and definitely with some sort of menu item that caused him to lick his lips, if that was all it took to get Tony's heated gaze on him. It wasn't the first time Steve had seen it, but this time felt more significant than the others; the moment, he believed, more real if only because it wasn't about humor, or flirting, or anything casual, but something lingering, something that made Steve glad he had walked in (and eavesdropped in) on this afternoon. A restaurant, and then a movie, and then Tony could take him back to the workshop so Steve could sketch him while Tony did his work and rambled to Steve about his newest blueprints, and they would, at some point, fall into the couch together to talk, and then fall asleep, not waking up until JARVIS bid them a good-morning as their alarm. 

“Say you only had a few weeks,” the ventilation system must have broken again as Steve's eyes snapped to where Tony was now staring directly at him, intent and trembling the slightest bit, “just a few weeks. What would you—?” 

It was obvious he couldn't say any more, that he felt helpless in the face of what he assumed to be the inevitable; Steve felt helpless as well. 

“I don't know,” was all he was able to manage. 

“You're terrible at this.” 

It didn't matter what Tony was talking about, because it was all the same, and all true. Tony was dying; Tony was dying and Steve couldn't follow his original plan anymore, dust in the wind and happily left behind—the serum took care of his asthma, but his lungs still ached in phantom pain. 

He was going to tell Tony Stark the truth about who he was. 

He was going to steal SHIELD property without a goddamn care in the world. 

He was going to save Tony Stark. God help him, he was going to save Tony Stark. 

And then he was going to woo Tony Stark until the man couldn't imagine life with anyone but Steve, the same way Steve was already unable to imagine his life without Tony.

(And they were going to make each other so, so happy.)


	3. Secret Agent Man

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve really just needs Tony to _open the damn box_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's a little short, I know; we're gearing up for the end, folks, but I'm planning on bringing this 'verse into Avengers 2012, so there's that. 
> 
> Hope you all enjoy. 
> 
> (Also, chapter title should be sung.)

The box was placed squarely on Tony's worktable. Steve had expected it to be open, rifled through, by the time he finally got down to Tony's workshop, but that didn't seem to be the case at all—Tony was, in fact, glaring down at it either suspiciously or as though it had insulted Pepper Potts; Steve suspected that it was virtually the same stare, just marked for various occasions. This was not, in any manner or capacity, what he was hoping for, and he hoped his confusion stayed on the correct side of 'professionally curious' and didn't venture into 'open the box, Tony, your destiny awaits' or something equally as... well, as weird as that sounded even in his own brain. He knocked on the door, unsurprised to find that the only response was a twitch of the engineer's hand, and a small, close-lipped smile that somehow, oddly enough, felt more intimate and real than any time Tony had bared his teeth for someone or another (and Steve _knew_ that the smile meant something, that the looks they gave one another were more than professional, more than the natural progression of working together for hours on end, more than anything else, maybe, Steve had experienced before; sometimes, and the thought killed him in his darker moments, he felt as though he was meant to live his newest life in the twenty-first century, that there was no other feasible way for him to thrive in anything other than Tony's carefully rafted environment that smelt like _home_.) Walking into the lab felt, more than anything else, like walking into the waiting arms of a a friend, and he resisted embracing Tony (pale and hallow-cheeked, with cuts littering the backs of his hands like freckles in the height of summer) as though he would a lover. 

“Hi.” It was a quiet statement—anything more would have displaced the stillness of what Steve now recognized as a workshop at rest. 

“Hi,” Tony replied, easy in a way that meant it wasn't easy at all. “What's new, pussycat? It's your day off.” 

“I just—” Steve shrugged it off, failing to fight off the blush that seemed to come into his cheeks whenever Tony seemed to know something about him that Steve hadn't actually said in conversation. “I wanted to come and say hi, see if you needed anything, how you were doing...”

He let it trail off there and didn't miss Tony scrunching up his nose (and were it any time before last week, before he had seen Tony scrunch his nose up when Steve brought up a sandwich on the nut bread he knew Tony loved but could never get because the bakery was across the bridge and would always run out before seven AM and so Steve had just not slept one night, walked there instead, got in line at five AM, jogged back to Manhattan for work, and then made Tony the sandwich; it wasn't actually that big of a deal, but Barton had shaken his head, gave Steve a long look, and now that Fury and Coulson were back, Steve was expecting a phone call or summons or something equally nebulous—really all he had to hope for was them not knowing about the box until later.) 

“I got a box.” Tony nodded towards it, as though Steve wouldn't have noticed the thing otherwise; Steve had, in fact, been resisting darting the box glances every three to five seconds, and so was hyper aware of the, well, the box in the room. 

“I can see that.” 

“It was sent from SHIELD.” 

Steve blinked. While it was true that Steve had sent the box from SHIELD, there was no indication of the sort labeled on the thing, so how on Earth had Tony known its origins? Maybe JARVIS actually was infiltrating SHIELD's databases like Fury's newest conspiracy theory suggested, but SHIELD didn't actually know the true extent of JARVIS's reach if only for the little fact that Steve never actually bothered to tell them; in for a penny, he figured, and was more than happy to omit little (marginal to large) things every now and again from his reports, or even fudge (fabricate) other parts entirely. It was just, Steve reasoned with himself, part of the spy business—it was really Fury's own fault for entrusting a serious mission to an agent that had no real allegiance to him other than convenience and ignorance—and who was Steve to go against this particular business ideal? (An idiot, that's who, and Steve was goddamn sure that his mama didn't raise no idiot.) 

“How d'ya figure?” he asked, leaning his hip against Tony's worktable the way he knew the other man liked—he crossed his arms across his chest and puffed it out a little (not at all like a peacock, no matter how silly it looked in the mirror) trying to throw the other man a casual look; he missed by a long mile and hoped Tony was too busy checking him out to notice his wobble as the only thing he threw was himself off-balance. 

“Well, it was the fact that when JARVIS scanned it, the top content was the quote-unquote 'passenger manifest' with all the lovely contents within printed nicely and in alphabetical order for yours truly to peeky-peek into.” 

“A table of contents,” Steve said dully, mind blanking at how on Earth he would convince Tony to open the box now. 

“Essentially.” 

“And SHIELD's logo?” 

“Just all out there, for anyone to see,” Tony confirmed. 

Steve pondered the fact that the spy agency he worked for was incompetent, then pondered that maybe he was incompetent, then came to the executive decision that both of those facts could easily be true enough; after all, why would a good spy agency recruit someone like Steve to work a covert mission with a hot brunet with an attitude? Idiocy all around. 

If he quit, he wouldn't have to deal with this anymore, but if he got fired, he could file for unemployment. He could, however, just continue working for Tony—he could quit, actually work for Tony, and then it actually wouldn't matter, except maybe his history would no longer exist (but he was already hired, so unless he royally fucked up, they wouldn't be checking his history anymore anyways, so even if that bridge _did_ burn...) 

“Hey, Steve?” 

Tony sounded nervous; Steve looked to him, watching the other man tap tap tap his fingers against the center of his chest, Steve only hearing the slight 'thud' of fingertips against cloth against metal due to his sensitive hearing. 

“What's up, Tony?” 

“I was talking to JARVIS...” 

He trailed off and Steve wondered what on Heaven and Earth he could be building up to. In a sudden burst of confidence, he took up Tony's free hand between the two of his, and squeezed it gently, knowing this couldn't be taken any other way, that he couldn't step back from this moment they had built—he wanted to be absolutely clear that no matter what, he was there for whatever Tony needed. (It was a lot to put onto someone, especially someone who had issues accepting this exact sort of devotion, but Steve felt it worth it, felt as though every day he would know the other man was another day to learn something more, something new, until he knew everything and vice versa and they wore one another like an old sweater in the winter.) 

“I'm going to die.”

Steve choked, his hands tightening against Tony's own. Tony took his other hand from his chest and placed it on top of one of Steve's, squeezing back as tightly as he could (it was weaker than before, and Steve knew, he did, he always did, but it never felt real until it was said.) 

“By our calculations, in a couple of weeks.” 

He took a breath and only then could Steve do the same. 

“Let's not play this game anymore, Steve. Whatever's in the box, will it help me? Or does that come after some weird SHIELD game that neither of us are very good at playing.” He paused. “Or too good at it, it doesn't matter. Why are you watching me die?” 

“Tony...” Steve didn't know it was possible to feel your heart get scooped out. Wildly, all he could think about was the fact that he wasn't even able to kiss the other man before fucking it all up, and he tried to clench his fists around where—around where Tony was not trying to pull away from Steve's too-tight grip. 

“Tony?” 

“Oh, honey, I've known since before you walked in the door.” 

Steve looked down to where Tony was raising a brow, and only then noticed the sweat gathering at his temples. 

“You're not well,” he murmured, prying a hand away from Tony's in order to swipe gently at the evidence of Tony's illness. 

“I'm dying,” Tony reminded him (and Steve knew it was him trying to be gentle, but it still felt like how he imagined a shield impact to the chest would be.) 

“There's a video, a model, or something, I don't know how—” he shook his head, “no one knows how, they were hoping you'd be able to figure it out by looking through it all. 

“I was going to quit.” 

“No unemployment,” Tony pointed out, taking a step closer to Steve instead of doing the sensible thing and rifling through the contents of the box; Steve did not give a singular shit because even with only a couple weeks, what could five minutes actually do? 

“I was just going to keep my job here,” Steve confessed, suddenly embarrassed about his plan—he wasn't a good PA. 

“You're a terrible PA,” Tony confirmed for Steve, as though his own incompetence was flashed across his forehead, “but more importantly, it wouldn't have been ethical. And, you know, against my personal policy.” 

“Which is?” Steve asked, wondering how it was he got pushed against the edge of the worktable, Tony hovering over him, inching closer with Steve's thighs flush against Tony's own. He was breathless in a completely different sort of way now, and he watched Tony track his tongue as it flicked out to lick his lips. 

“What do you think, Steven?” Tony replied rhetorically, lowering his eyes until all he was looking up at Steve with were his lashes; the other man smirked and Steve knew that he was close enough to feel the reaction that maneuver had on him. 

It was okay, though, because when Steve angled himself down sharply, he felt an answering reaction from Tony, and that was more than enough to make up for the embarrassment. 

“I'm going to kiss you,” Steve stated seriously, swooping Tony down a little in his arms until the sparkle in Tony's eyes reached the appropriate level of romantic fulfillment Steve had been hoping for, “if you'll have me.” 

“What if I live?” 

“Especially if you live,” Steve promised, and when Tony nodded and grinned (goddamn, was Steve gone for this man) he couldn't help but grin back, silly, stupid, and more than a little besotted. 

And when they kissed? 

Absolutely perfect. 

(Tony passing out in his arms, however, dampened the moment a bit. 

But Steve digressed.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you're welcome


	4. Day bow bow (chk-chka-ch-kahh)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> but can tony find a cure to his palladium poisoning before it's too late???? 
> 
> spoiler: yes, he can! and then he and Steve makeout

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know it's been forever, I just,,, yes. If you're here, thank you so much for keeping with me in these months, bereft of this fourth chapter lol. 
> 
> Anyways! Just the epilogue left, and then be on the lookout for the second part of this series wherein I tackle Avengers (2012). 
> 
> Chapter title is technically that one 80s song, but I always think of [this scene from IASiP](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7i0V26wWiM), because it's fitting.

“Okay, what about now?” 

“When there is progress, I will be sure to inform you, Captain,” JARVIS answered gamely (for the fifth time in only twice as many minutes) all the while seeming to ignore Steve's increasingly harried motions. 

“Steve,” Steve said for what felt like the tenth time since his 'secret identity' had been revealed—though Steve had to admit that the title, no matter how much he loathe the implications of who he was and who he was expected to be in this world (the past, the present, the future) suited him more than he would ever like to admit, especially when said with as much fondness as an AI could produce—and ignored the fact that JARVIS would call him no such thing. “And you're sure he said that he would tell me when he was finished?” 

“He did,” JARVIS confirmed, shorter than the last time he had answered, and if Steve didn't know any better he would presume that JARVIS was now getting mildly irritated by his incessant questioning, “and as soon as Sir confirms his success to me, you—along with Colonel Rhodes and Ms. Potts—will be promptly notified.” A pause as though JARVIS were contemplating what else to say to Steve; Steve, in slight confusion, managed to cease his pacing as he looked up at the corner of the ceiling that he knew that JARVIS did not reside in. 

“There is an eighty-five point seven-six percent chance that Sir will be able to understand, process, and synthesize whatever needs to be, in order to preserve his life.” 

“Yes, well, he does have someone waiting for him, after all.” 

Steve made an about-face in order to face Ms. Potts fully, his heart beating in a rhythm he hadn't felt since his arrhythmia had been cured as par the course of his scientific experimentation; she had somehow managed to sneak up on him, despite her spiked heels and his own heightened sense of spatial awareness and were it in any other circumstance (e.g. when Tony was not currently attempting to create a cure to his inevitable death and Steve couldn't think of anything other than being _this close_ to the rest of his life, only to have it be taken away by an enemy long dead) he would be appalled at his inattention. 

“I'm speaking of you, of course,” she continued, a what seemed to be wry smile on her lips as Steve's eyes trained on anything other than the closed doors he had been staring at for the last who knew how long. 

“And James and I as a given, but...” she hesitated and Steve felt his lips thinning as he sucked them into his moth in anticipation of what Virginia was attempting to say.

“There's always been you, Steven Rogers, since before either of us had ever come into his life.” 

Forestalling anything Steve might say, she held up a hand and continued. “It's different now, of course—now that you're here and real in a way more accessible than ever imagined—but it was always there. You were always there.” 

Steve cleared his throat and blinked against whatever moisture had been creeping up in the backs of his eyes as the CEO of Stark Ind. said her piece. 

A moment went by, the two of them attempting to establish a bond through prolonged eye contact, before Steve nodded. 

“It mighta been meant to be.” 

He paused. “I didn' know what I was gonna do after the war. After I got back. This is—

“This is good. Right.” 

Maintaining eye contact, he finished. “I saw Tony Stark and I saw _everything_.”

* * *

Steve, head between his legs as he huddled in the doorway separating Tony's lab from the hallway he was in, had started to lightly doze—he had stayed awake for longer a multitude of occasions, and had wanted to stay awake until Tony, himself, had taken a rest—when the door, with its pneumatic hiss, slid open and he half fell into the opening. 

“Hey, Steve.” 

The voice was fond and Steve registered the presence of the person kneeling beside him before his mind could actually comprehend who it was inhabiting most of his field of vision; it was an apparition of everything Steve had ever dreamed of, he was sure of it—dark hair and bright eyes, a tiny smile that Steve _knew_ was rationed out to those deemed worthy enough to be on the receiving end of the expression, all packaged in a scruffy, naturally divine package.

“Tony,” he breathed out, knowing that every emotion was displayed easily on his face—he was more than a little grateful to his inability to deny himself his feelings when his words brought a blush, a besotted grin, to the other man's face. 

“Steve,” the man repeated, and there was something in it that snapped him to attention. 

“Tony!” 

Tony laughed, and as Steve's gaze raked over him, his hands only just stopping themselves from doing the same thing, he recognized a lightness that he knew existed, but hadn't actually experienced—laughter had been there, happiness, but the pall had been cast from before their first interaction, and had colored every moment between the two of them. 

“What—did you—is everything— _Tony_.”

Another laugh answered him—had it been any other time between the two of them, any other universe, and Steve would have felt affronted at the seemingly irreverent gesture— and he grinned, elated without knowing why. 

“I did it.” 

Steve blinked, cocked his head, and was stopped from saying anything by Tony's fingertips brushing gently against his lips; Steve swallowed, eyes going dark at the motion as his own fingers traced lightly against Tony's collar, his carotid artery, his jawline, until it found itself tangled, clenched, gently in the downy hair at the nape of his neck. 

“I think I love you.” 

As both of the statements penetrated Steve's brain, he couldn't help the immediate tears that came to his eyes. 

“Aw, Jesus, Tony,” he managed to get out, strangled against the onslaught that seized him, “you can't just—” 

He cut himself off without a thought to care and seized Tony's hips in his hands, pulling the slighter man towards him with an ease that (he could admit to himself) didn't belong in a relationship that wasn't even all that defined as such. Their foreheads collided gently, and Tony's huff of an exhale hit Steve's lips in a motion that sent goose pimples running down his arms and into the epicenter of his stomach—coals lit within him and his body couldn't do anything other than respond to the closeness of the man he could smell forever on. 

“I _know_ I love you.” 

Tony groaned and Steve saw his pupils dilate in the scant seconds before lips descended upon his own, a nip of teeth against Steve's bottom lip making him moan, heady—coming out as more of a growl than anything intelligible—before opening his mouth to where the man on top of him was requesting entrance to. Steve's hand slithered up the back of Tony's t-shirt, and he ghosted his fingertips over the length of the the other man's spine, a shudder passing through his own in response to Tony's involuntary movement. Moving his legs to a more convenient position, Steve nevertheless found himself gasping at the friction between the two of them that the motion caused. 

“You did it?” he asked as the brunet separated their mouths, grinning and planting wet kisses up Steve's jawline. Gasping, Steve's neck fell to the side as he raised his legs to force Tony's position higher on his hips, the action bringing their groins closer together—a motion that Steve most certainly planned and didn't find himself regretting at any point in the future. 

“I did,” Tony agreed, slightly breathlessly as he puffed out a breath against Steve's ear before bringing the lobe gently between his teeth and mouthing it; he moved, after a moment of Steve unable to do anything more than gasp helplessly at his lover's ministrations, back center so their noses brushed and their lips would do the same, if only one of them spoke; Steve, his hand now slowly making its way towards the waistband of Tony's jeans, decided to be the one to do so. 

“And you're okay?” 

“I will be.” 

Steve's brow furrowed and didn't cease its crease until Tony's thumb gently rubbed above the bridge of his nose. “Worrywart—it'll take a bit, of course, but I'm good for at least a couple of decades.” 

“Well, that's something,” Steve agreed solemnly, making a mental note to do something about the 'couple of decades' sooner rather than later. Then, in a flash and almost irrationally (but not so much if one considered who he was before he was known throughout the country, who he still was, despite everything that had been hurled at him through the years and the trials and the wars) he wondered if, now that Tony had time, he was still—

“Steve?” 

The question brought him out of his thoughts, and Steve watched, in real time, what he imagined his own thought processes to look like. 

“I wanna take you out,” he blurted, before Tony could actually ask a question (Steve didn't want to ask it, himself, and he could only imagine that Tony wasn't any different in that department.)

“Properly. If you'll let me, of course.” 

They looked at each other, and really, the burgeoning grin was all the answer Steve needed, but the almost hushed 'yes' followed by a kiss that seared him to his soul expertly put any doubts that Steve might have still been harboring out of his mind and out of the locked position they found themselves in. Steve's grip tightened on the hair at the base of Tony's neck and he gently tilted the other man's head in order to suck a hard bruise into his collarbone. 

“Oh,” Tony breathed out, the hitch in his voice complemented by a rolling thrust of his hips that set Steve's teeth on edge and a heaviness at the back of his throat; Tony was not the first person that Steve had lost himself in arousal with, but as he swallowed heavily in order to control himself for just a little bit longer, he had to admit that no one else had ever set him on this sort of precipice—dizzy and desperate and a little bit wild. (And no one, he believed wholeheartedly, else would.) 

“We should...” Steve mumbled, knowing that there was an end to his sentence somewhere but losing it in the process of hitching up Tony's shirt, eyes wandering down his chest in both appreciation and residual worry—there was, as Tony had implied, nothing there, but it didn't hurt to check, just to make sure. Some of his expression must have clued the other man in on his thoughts, as the next thing he heard was a vaguely annoyed growl and a pinch on his left nipple from where Tony's hand had slid up Steve's button-down. The motion stopped him dead in whatever tracks he had been trying to lay, and he looked up the millimeters into where Tony was already staring at him, one brow cocked in a gesture that shot another bolt of arousal through Steve's already charged body. 

“We should move this somewhere else,” he finally managed to say, before negating his own words to plant a hand at the middle of Tony's back, bending the other man slightly backwards as he flicked his tongue at the upper rim of Tony's belly button. The other man's stomach heaved, a giggle competing with a moan as Steve moved his mouth up slowly, the trail of saliva left behind against the cool air causing Tony's skin to stand up in the wake of Steve's assault. 

“Okay,” Tony agreed easily, hauling himself back into a semblance of an upright position—his hair was mussed, his lips bitten and red, and Steve swallowed against the onslaught of emotion that now suddenly wanted to wreak havoc on his person. 

“Okay,” Steve parroted, his mind going blank for five point two seconds as Tony's hips wiggled against his own hard on, before he managed to get his head on straight enough in order to haul the both of them up; Steve felt more than heard Tony's moan against his mouth as he easily stood with Tony's limbs still clinging to him, the sort of limpet that—if the tightening of Tony's thighs were anything to go by as Steve walked them to the room he had been staying in on and off for the past week and a half—wouldn't let go unless pried off (Steve, of course, would have to be pried off of Tony first, so the point was more than a little moot.) 

Everything slowed down the slightest bit when they landed on the bed, Steve's face hovering scant inches from Tony's own, the lower halves of their bodies pressed tightly together; from the sudden stillness came a rush of euphoria in the knowledge that _this_ could get to a place considered normal, that they would have time to do this and everything and more. Steve grinned, pressing his forehead against Tony's, and metered out small kisses wherever he could reach without moving positions. 

“Let's just—” he stopped after a moment, one of his hands wandering in Tony's hair, the other stroking gently at the man's flank. Tony made an inquiring noise in the back of his throat—Steve could feel the vibration run down his body—before puffing out breaths in time with Steve's own, a quiet settling between them as quickly as the previous passion had been put on simmer. 

“Yeah,” Tony replied, one of his hands scratching idly at Steve's hairline above his ear, the other dipping down into the back collar of his shirt as his legs released their death grip on Steve's hips in order to tangle with Steve's own legs. “Let's just...” 

Steve could kiss the man for understanding exactly what he meant—in fact, he did kiss the man for understanding. 

“You're alive,” he whispered after a moment. 

“Yeah.” Tony paused, before letting out a huff of laughter and running his fingertips over the shell of Steve's ear. “I really am.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a kisseru from me to you~
> 
> _me, when writing this:_ it's appropriate to use 'carotid artery' in a makeout scene, right????  
>  _my sister, horrified:_ .... what. 
> 
> [hit me up in the comments if you want a fic or something—I don't write smut but can write for like 5 million fandoms (which I will happily comment upon or put in my profile for perusal) ;D]


	5. it's like those scenes, after the credits, in the marvel movies, you know the ones

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> it's the end of the fic as we know it, and i feel fine. 
> 
> overformatted, epistolary action along with a peek into what comes for Avengers (2012)—coming soon to a web broswer near you.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're at the end of the line, folks, and you're going to have to get on the 'series' train to continue on this journey. 
> 
> I hope you've enjoyed this crazy, crazy venture with me, and I hope to see you soon for the continuing adventures of Tony and Steve.

**Tony Stark** anthonystark@starkind.net  
to  
Nick Fury, Maria Hill, Phil Coulson  
**The news of my ignorance/death has been greatly exaggerated**

To my super secret spies, my men in black, my own personal spooks, &c. and so forth, 

I'm still alive, no thanks to you assholes. Also, sending in Steve Rogers as a spy? Dumb as shit. 

Attached is a more thorough explanation. 

Talk to you soon—I'm sure we won't be rid of each other that easily. 

Tony Stark  
PhD, Fuck You U. 

attch: **SRresgfinal.mov**

* * *

This is a computer-generated transcript of the audio content of Srresgfinal.mov—if you find any errors, please consult the technicians at our opensource script at transcripts4theearth@mail.com. 

_Voice 1: Captain Steven G. Rogers for Director Fury and, well [audio fry] everyone else who's watching this right now, I guess._

_So I was caught out even before I got into the building—or so Tony's said to me. [pause] Multiple times. In increasingly gleeful tones; that's on you. It's your mess, I mean. [pause] Well, what I mean to say is that I don't think I can work for SHIELD anymore... And not just because Tony Stark found me out before I found myself out._

_Voice 2: What does that even **mean** , Steve? _

_V.1: It's a... [audio fry] Tony, it's a metaphor._

_V.2: That was nothing like a metaphor. A metaphor, which they apparently didn't teach you back in the stone age, is—_

_[audio fry]_

_V.1_ [based on best guess] _: Anyway, I'd like to take my vacation—two weeks'll be fine. I'm also giving my two weeks notice._

_[pause]_

_V.1: So I guess we're done here._

_V.2: Also, you shouldn't make a guy like Steve do this shit—it doesn't work for anyone involved that's not on his level. [audio fry] Lucky me, then._

_V.1: Don't make me blush like that, babydoll, it'll ruin what's left of my credibility._

_V.2: [audio fry] Like you have any; it took you like, what—two minutes? To drop SHIELD like a hot potato._

_V.1: I saw your face, Tony, and the stars aligned—what'd you expect me to do?_

_V.2: Jesus Christ, how can you just say [audio fry]_

_V.1: Oh, like you didn't— [audio fry]_

_V.2: [pause] [audio fry] [pause] J—cut the camera._

End transcript.

* * *

**Bruce Banner** bruceandthebanners@mail.co.me  
to  
Tony Stark  
**Re: grant proposal**

Dr. Stark, 

While I find it unlikely that I will be heading back to the states anytime soon, I would be interested in learning more about your orbital medical offices in war-torn countries and how my services could realistically be provided. 

Your other proposal? I suppose if/when needs must. 

You can find me at this email—I assume, considering who you are, it's secure? 

Sincerely,  
Bruce Banner

* * *

“So, what're you gonna call this backup group?” 

“The Avengers.” 

“You're really keeping that name?”

“It's a nice fuck-you, I think... Maybe I'll call it 'Tony Stark's Avengers.'”

“Tony Stark Presents: The Avengers.” 

“The Avengers, featuring Tony Stark.” 

“That's the one, that one, right there.” 

“Thanks, babe, I'll give you a byline.” 

“Introducing Steven Rogers as: besotted boyfriend?” 

“Hot damn, we've got ourselves a movie!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> xoxo
> 
> contact at: newyorktopaloalto@mail.com


End file.
